


... Had Roast Beef (Pizza)

by SEpupppupp (ForNought)



Series: This Little Piggy [3]
Category: Produce 101 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Dog poo, M/M, There is no plot, after school shenanigans, an unresolved sub-plot that i may never revisit, doyeon & co attend fictional sopa, everyone also loves sunghyuk, everyone loves jihoon, hyunmin and haknyeon are sort of dumb
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-28
Updated: 2017-06-28
Packaged: 2018-11-20 07:53:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,497
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11331585
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ForNought/pseuds/SEpupppupp
Summary: Hyunmin has been waiting and waiting for Haknyeon to finally ask him on a date. When he finally does, it turns out not to be the case at all.





	... Had Roast Beef (Pizza)

Hyunmin hadn’t asked Haknyeon on a date yet. They were still in an awkward stage where they both knew how Hyunmin felt but neither of them was acting on it. Hyunmin was happy telling Haknyeon that his eyes were extra sparkly, or that the way his nose wrinkled when he was really happy was the cutest thing in the world. Haknyeon was still working on his compliments. Which was why Hyunmin was taken completely off guard when Haknyeon shyly approached his desk at lunch.

“Joo Haknyeon! Did I mention today that your skin looks extra smooth today? Did you get a lot of sleep last night? Or were you napping during our Maths lesson?” Hyunmin said, all while stealing the chair from the neighbouring desk and dragging it so Haknyeon could sit facing him. Haknyeon scratched at the back of his neck nervously. He must really have been sleeping during Maths.

Haknyeon sat down on the chair Hyunmin had procured for him and stared at Hyunmin for a moment.

“Aren’t you going to eat?” Hyunmin asked.

“I am,” Haknyeon said, snapping the lip off his lunchbox. He made no further moves to eat and kept squinting at Hyunmin before his shoulders sagged. “You sounded really smart when you answered that question earlier.”

“Oh, thank you!” Hyunmin said happily through a mouthful of half-chewed sausages. In truth he had been dozing when the teacher had raised her voice enough to startle Hyunmin to full alertness. He didn’t think he sounded particularly smart and he had noticed how quickly Haknyeon twisted in his seat to meet his eyes.

He was glad that Haknyeon thought he sounded smart. Not too many people said that about Hyunmin these days. He was more likely to hear that he was too much of a fool for Haknyeon. He couldn’t deny that. Hyunmin was proud to be a fool for Haknyeon. He would work harder to sound smarter to impress him even more in future.

“Are you still not eating?” Hyunmin asked when he noticed that Haknyeon was just poking miserably at his food. “Haknyeonnie, are you sick?”

Haknyeon shook his head quickly. “That isn’t it. I just had a question for you.”

Hyunmin stopped eating. He swallowed the food that was already in his mouth, wincing at the pain. “What is it, Haknyeon? Whatever it is I will do it for you! Do you want me to fight someone for you? I shouldn't do that because I might get kicked out of my Taekwondo club, but I could try to do it in secret.”

Haknyeon shook his head. “Please, don’t fight anybody. Never ever. Please. If you need to fight somebody I will do it for you.”

Hyunmin grinned. “Ooh! The beautiful Joo Haknyeon is going to protect me with those arms he is so proud of?”

Haknyeon blushed, soft and pretty. Hyunmin was certain this was true love.

“Hyunmin, you know I would do anything for you.”

“I know.” Hyunmin reached his hand across the desk and smiled more widely when Haknyeon linked their hands together tightly. “Haknyeon, you know I would do anything for you too. What was it you wanted to ask me?”

Haknyeon was still hesitating but he nodded when Hyunmin squeezed his hand. Haknyeon sat up a bit straighter and nodded quickly.

“Hyunmin, I want you to go somewhere with me after school, today.”

“You want me to go somewhere with you?”

“That’s right. We should go to a restaurant my sister told me about. They have really nice pizza.”

“Today?”

“Yes, please. I think we should make an effort to spend more time together.”

A date! A date!

Hyunmin didn't jump up from his seat to whoop and cheer like he wanted to - his joy was cut short by his excited jolt slopping broth all over his biology textbook. He wailed instead as Haknyeon muttered terrible things about how Hyunmin should put his books away safely before eating. Hyunmin was happy to be told off over this, he decided as he watched Haknyeon try to scrape liquid from Hyunmin’s book with the blade of his hand. They were going on a date! Haknyeon could do as much telling off as he liked!

 

 

Hyunmin later discovered that they were not on a date at all. He lamented his hopeful exuberance and zest for life.

He hadn't even noticed how wrong he was until Haknyeon stopped shyly swinging their hands between them as they walked. Haknyeon had waved happily to Hyungseob who waved back just as happily until he had fused himself to Haknyeon before they had even left the school premises.

Hyunmin had looked at Sunghyuk, mostly wondering why he was almost always attached to Hyungseob, and said, “Can't you do something about him? Haknyeon and I have some very important business to attend to.”

Sunghyuk had blinked back slowly before smiling brightly. “We are coming too!”

Hyunmin had been on the verge of telling Sunghyuk just how wrong he was - a vicious chastisement was right on the tip of his tongue - when Haknyeon hefted Hyungseob more securely on his back and said, “I wanted us all to try the new pizza together! Did I not say it had an interesting new topping?”

Haknyeon hadn't said anything about anything. Unless he had and Hyunmin had been too stupidly happy to pay attention.

Hyunmin liked pizza. Hyunmin liked Haknyeon more than he liked pizza. He couldn't even be mad! Haknyeon was so wonderful and cute! He just wanted to spend some time with his friends and introduce them to new pizza toppings! Hyunmin was disappointed, but even that wasn't enough to break the wave of adoration that washed over him.

Haknyeon really was wonderful!

 

Joo Haknyeon was the most wonderful person on earth. Hyunmin would tell anyone who would listen all the reasons that it was true. The only problem was that the world didn't treat Haknyeon accordingly.

They hadn't even reached their destination (an apparently famous pizza parlour that had featured in several internet lists of the best places to dine) when something terrible occurred. A tiny, scrappy looking Shiba Inu had appeared. Haknyeon did what any adorable young man might do, and crouched down to set about petting the dog.

Haknyeon and the dog made a very wonderful, heart-warming sight which Hyunmin was dedicated to immortalising on his phone. It was such a pure image until the fidgety dog, trembling with exertion, pooed on Haknyeon's foot.

Hyungseob had shrieked - some hellish hybrid of glee and disgust - while Sunghyuk urgently looked around for the evil creature's owner. Haknyeon just stared at his foot.

“Haknyeon, are you alright?” Hyunmin asked. He already knew the answer before Haknyeon turned wide, watery eyes on him and jutted out his lower lip. Hyunmin crouched beside Haknyeon and hugged him - sideways of course so he could avoid as much of the mess on Haknyeon’s shoes as possible.

“That cute dog…” Haknyeon didn’t get much further before his trembling voice broke and he wailed loudly. The cute dog in question was running in circles and yapping happily, clearly free of its burden. Hyunmin did the only thing he could think to do. Very quickly, he pressed his lips to Haknyeon’s cheek. He didn’t think it would make Haknyeon cry even louder.

“I’m sorry, Haknyeon,” Hyunmin said quickly. Haknyeon shook his head but even Hyunmin couldn’t decipher the blubbing babble coming from Haknyeon’s mouth. Hyunmin patted Haknyeon’s head gently and hoped there was something he could do to make everything better.

Sunghyuk seemed to be trying his best to make things better too. Hyunmin never thought he would see the day Sunghyuk squared up to an adult to scold them over not controlling their pet. He looked kind of cool. He didn’t even flinch when the man raised his hand as though to slap him and uttered a string of swears that had Hyungseob clapping his hands over his ears.

The man seemed to decide there was no point prolonging the ordeal and left with his dog, still not on a lead, quickly afterwards.

“Haknyeonnie,” Sunghyuk pouted, reaching out to hold Haknyeon’s hand. Haknyeon had given up on sniffling and spluttering and gave a watery smile to Sunghyuk.

It was decided that Sunghyuk should stay together with Haknyeon while Hyunmin and Hyungseob went in search of a solution to clean Haknyeon up a bit. They went to a nearby cafe after Hyungseob had the brilliant idea of taking napkins and spoons to scrape away the worst of the mess.

Hyunmin had agreed it was a brilliant idea up until Hyungseob knocked most of the supplies out of Hyunmin’s hands to shove his head into Hyunmin’s already quite full blazer.

“What are you doing?” Hyunmin asked.

“Shut up,” Hyungseob hissed as he pressed closer to Hyunmin and they awkwardly shuffled out of the cafe. It was not until they were outside that Hyungseob regained his sense of personal space and recomposed himself. “I don’t much like the scent of your deodorant, Hyunmin.”

“What’s wrong with it?” Hyunmin asked, trying to covertly get a whiff himself.

“It’s not as nice as the one Sunghyuk uses.”

“Forget that,” Hyunmin grumbled. “Why did you do that?”

Hyungseob sighed and flipped his hair a bit. “Did you not see? All those yellow kids sitting around and sipping lattes and giggling together. Kim Doyeon was in there. I am avoiding her and her friend who hates me.”

“Why are you avoiding Kim Doyeon?” Hyunmin asked slowly.

Hyungseob chuckled and wiped at his nose before pointing at Hyunmin. “We kissed. Things have been awkward after our kiss.”

“You never kissed Kim Doyeon.” Hyunmin would most definitely not been able to avoid hearing about it. Hyungseob was one of the prettiest kids in their whole school, but Kim Doyeon was one of the prettiest kids in the whole of Seoul, let alone her own school. Nobody would have been able to keep quiet about that, especially not Ahn Hyungseob.

Hyunmin frowned and Hyungseob chuckled again, as though he was in on some brilliant joke that Hyunmin would never understand.

“Hyunmin, I did kiss Doyeon. I had a dream about it.”

“That’s not real!”

“Anyway, I told her about it and she told her friend - girlfriend? Whatever. Anyway, Choi Yoojung said she would kill me if I went near Doyeon again. Also, my skin isn’t in very good condition today. See? I have a zit starting to take form on my chin. I can’t let Doyeon see me like this.”

Hyunmin couldn’t believe what he was hearing. Well, he could believe it, but he wished he didn’t have to hear it. He really wondered about his friends sometimes. He didn’t even bother responding to Hyungseob before he walked back to Haknyeon and Sunghyuk. They were smiling now, holding hands on the bench where they had been left. It was a nice sight considering the situation.

Hyunmin passed Haknyeon what little he had left to clean up the mess. Haknyeon smiled and set about his gruesome task.

It was going relatively well until the point a loud voice shouted, “Ahn Hyungseob!”

Hyungseob groaned and waved back at the girl who was attracting plenty of other attention with the volume of her voice and the wild waving of her arms.

“Oh, goodness, she is beautiful,” Hyungseob grumbled, still waving politely back. “What am I going to do if she comes over here? Did she follow us out? She must have caught the smell of your cheap deodorant, Hyunmin.”

“Do you want to get hit?” Hyunmin asked.

Hyungseob widened his eyes comically and angled his jaw in Hyunmin’s direction. “Hit me, see if I don’t hit you back twice as hard.”

“You can’t hit my Hyunminnie,” Haknyeon said quietly. He didn’t look up from his shoes as he gingerly scraped at them with coffee stirrers. “I will have to hit Hyungseobbie a hundred times as hard because I love Hyunminnie a hundred times more than I love Hyungseobbie.”

Hyunmin was quite sure he was about to die! Haknyeon loved him! A hundred times more than he loved Hyungseob! And in a really cute voice to boot! Haknyeon was really too much!

Hyunmin looked over at Hyungseob to gloat, but Hyungseob had clocked the approach of his impending doom.

Hyungseob smiled brightly when Kim Doyeon waltzed over in all of her statuesque beauty. It was quite different to the despondent pouting about how he would look if they stood next to one another. They hugged tightly and Doyeon even squealed excitedly as she lifted Hyungseob from the ground.

She was very strong despite being so rakishly thin.

Hyunmin had seen Kim Doyeon in person a few times, but still he felt himself shrinking away from the radiance of her smile as she waved.

“Hyungseob, you have so many cute friends!” she said. She was obviously just being polite because the only cute friend he could see was Joo Haknyeon who was currently, and very uncutely, trying to scrape dog poo from his shoes. He was making a real mess of the job with flimsy napkins and coffee stirrers procured from the cafe across the street, but Hyunmin thought that even when he was being uncute it was unfairly cute.

“You don't have to lie to me, Doyeon, we both know that you have much cuter friends,” Hyungseob said so that his voice carried. Doyeon did have some very cute friends but none of them were Joo Haknyeon (who loved Hyunmin a hundred times more than he loved Hyungseob).

“Our Haknyeon is cuter,” Hyunmin said even more loudly. Haknyeon,  with his hands full of napkins and faecal matter,  balked and turned a very pleasant shade of pink at this and called back in a happy voice.

“Our Hyunmin is cuter and stronger!”

Doyeon smiled and prodded Hyungseob in the centre of his chest. “Saying things so insincerely isn't going to make my friends like you. Especially Daengie. She said she was going to hate you for the rest of her life.”

Hyungseob looked genuinely confused by this. Hyunmin wondered if Hyungseob had somehow already forgotten the reason he had provided just moments before.  

“Why would she hate me?” He asked, his bottom lip already jutting out.

“I wouldn't know about that,” Doyeon shrugged. She looked over her shoulder and when Hyunmin followed the line of her sight he saw Choi Yoojung wearing a very sour expression as she crouched behind a bush a few metres away.

Yoojung’s expression grew more disgruntled the longer she stared at Hyungseob and Doyeon, wrapped so tightly together in some once-in-a-lifetime combination of beauty. Hyunmin was surprised that Sunghyuk didn’t look at all bothered by the display. Doyeon and Hyungseob’s hands were firmly fixed in places that would make more modest people blush. Hyungseob was quite a vocal fan of his own backside. Yoojung looked closer to becoming a fan of kicking Hyungseob’s backside.

“Well, I don't hate Choi Yoojung,” Hyungseob announced loudly. “She is very beautiful and talented and so, so smart!”

Yoojung’s glare turned to a snarl at this. Hyunmin noticed that Hyungseob’s hands were creeping somewhere underneath Doyeon’s blazer and decided the expression was more related to that than whatever sycophantic words sprouted from Hyungseob’s lips.

Hyunmin was sure that the situation was going to turn more violent until another voice called out, “Is that Seo Sunghyuk?”

Most people knew Park Jihoon by sight if not by some conversation where he had dazzled them into loving him. Hyunmin counted himself in both camps, though his love for Jihoon was strictly admiration that someone could make everyone they met like them, and paled in comparison to the undeniable way his heart fluttered whenever Haknyeon smiled at him. He was sure that Hyungseob must have known Jihoon in at least one of these ways too because he was very well acquainted with Jihoon’s classmates.

Perhaps he hadn't even noticed Jihoon was there at all while he remained embroiled in a staring contest with Choi Yoojung who was glaring at him from several feet away. Hyunmin definitely noticed as Jihoon smiled serenely, his uniform blazer an uncanny shade of gold as he descended upon them, and planted himself on the bench beside Sunghyuk. Even Haknyeon faltered and offered an uncertain greeting while staring down at the unpleasant mess on his shoes.

“What seems to be the matter?” Jihoon asked conversationally. Haknyeon quietly mumbled his way through explaining that a rogue Shiba had pounced in his path only to defecate on his shoe while he paused to stroke it. Jihoon pulled an expertly sympathetic face and said, “That is some awful luck. You can use my ruler to try to scrape off some of it if you'd like.”

Haknyeon's eyes boggled as Jihoon started digging through his school bag for a ruler. Even Hyunmin was conflicted. It was an opportunity to have something that Park Jihoon had actually owned and touched, but it was also about to be covered in excrement. Haknyeon took the plastic ruler that was offered and started at it.

“Would you like me to do it?” Jihoon asked. He was already pulling disposable gloves from his bag and Hyunmin really wondered why he had them at all. So, he asked.

“Why do you have gloves?”

“They're useful,” Jihoon said with a smile and a wink. After pulling the gloves onto his hands he took the ruler back from Haknyeon - Hyunmin sympathised with the expression of loss - and leaned heavily across Sunghyuk’s lap as he set about scraping the poo from Haknyeon's shoes.

It was a job that would never truly be finished and Hyunmin hoped that Haknyeon's sister would be able to buy him new shoes, but there was much less of a smearing of manure on Haknyeon's shoes when Jihoon declared the job done. What Hyunmin wondered was how Hyungseob had not yet noticed what was happening. Doyeon certainly had and kept peering around Hyungseob’s head with keen interest.

“Sunghyuk, I should have a plastic bag and some disposable tissues in my school bag. And some hand sanitiser. Could you be a dear and fetch them out for me?”

Sunghyuk obliged cautiously. Almost as though he was one of the few people in the world who wouldn’t jump at the chance to pretend to be close to Park Jihoon. Inside Jihoon’s bag there were so many useful things. Hyunmin couldn’t help but remain interested while Sunghyuk pulled out lip balm, a calculator, a manicure set, multiple pairs of glasses, and a small first aid kit before finally retrieving what he was meant to. Jihoon only smiled sunnily and peeled off the gloves and dropped them into the plastic bag along with the ruler and the handfuls of napkins that Haknyeon was still holding in confusion.

Baby wipes were also in Jihoon’s possession and Hyunmin wondered where Jihoon found room for his actual school supplies. But maybe that didn’t matter, Hyunmin thought as he watched Jihoon drape himself over Sunghyuk once more as he tenderly swiped over Haknyeon’s hands with the baby wipes before depositing a splodge of hand sanitiser in his palms.

“Sunghyuk, would you like some too?” Jihoon asked brightly. Sunghyuk held his hands out, but rather than an unceremonious raspberry pink blob of gel being squirted onto his hands, Jihoon squirted some onto his own hand and started to massage Sunghyuk’s hands with slow, sweeping motions.

“Thank you very much,” Sunghyuk said when the sanitiser had no doubt evaporated. Jihoon smiled more widely and continued to stroke Sunghyuk’s hands.

“You should take better care of your hands, Sunghyuk. They are very precious. Perhaps I should give you some hand cream too. Not that your hands aren’t already perfectly soft, of course. I only think you should pamper yourself whenever you can.”

“When did you two get so close?” Hyunmin asked as Jihoon retrieved a tube of hand cream from the depths of his school bag. Haknyeon looked just as interested and it was a mystery how Hyungseob hadn’t yet said anything.

“Who? Seo Sunghyuk and I?” Jihoon asked as he looked between Hyunmin and Haknyeon. “I have always considered us to be close. If I had to ascribe a date to the start of our friendship I would suggest it was around late Spring, wouldn’t you, Sunghyuk?”

Sunghyuk looked as though he had no such thoughts on the matter but he nodded nonetheless. Something was strange. It didn’t make sense that Jihoon would be so lavish with his affections upon Sunghyuk. Hyunmin had never heard of this friendship before. It looked like Haknyeon hadn’t either as he said, “How did you become friends?”

“My heart was won over by a display of strength,” Jihoon confessed matter-of-factly. He widened his eyes and held Sunghyuk’s hands close to his chest almost shyly. “Ah, my choice of words just now was quite strange, wasn’t it?”

Hyunmin wasn’t about to disagree. It was only a week ago that Hyungseob had called Hyunmin in the middle of the night, waking him up from a wonderful dream of agricultural domesticity with Haknyeon. The call hadn’t been long, Hyungseob only excitedly whispering, “I kissed Sunghyuk today, and he didn’t cry at all!” before hanging up.

A week ago, Sunghyuk had definitely kissed Hyungseob (Hyunmin doubted Hyungseob would lie about something like that) and all of a sudden it seemed Sunghyuk was having dalliances all over the place. It was strange. Hyunmin didn’t like it, and not only because Sunghyuk did not seem like the ‘player’ type.

“Ahn Hyungseob, shouldn’t you have something to say about this?”

Hyungseob finally looked over from his curious embrace with Doyeon. “What?”

Finally he looked properly and narrowed his eyes. He released Doyeon and for the first time Yoojung’s face relaxed. She even moved from behind the bush she was crouched behind. She took a few steps towards the rest of them while Hyungseob approached the bench where Sunghyuk was looking confused about everything. At least other people had no idea about what was going on too. Hyunmin was beginning to think he had slipped into an alternate reality where Seo Sunghyuk was the most desirable person on earth despite the existence of one Joo Haknyeon.

“Is there a particular reason you are touching him like that?” Hyungseob asked. It was almost as though he was trying to sound disaffected but the way his shoulder barged into Hyunmin’s and he folded his arms across his chest was very affected. Jihoon blinked up at him with wide-eyed innocence. Hyunmin hadn’t missed Jihoon’s hand comfortably curled over Sunghyuk’s thigh.

“Is there a particular reason I would need to explain anything to you?” Jihoon asked. Hyungseob’s face stung from the acerbic edge and his gaze flickered to Hyunmin. Hyunmin very decidedly wanted to stay out of this. He didn’t know what was happening. He knew what this looked like but he didn’t want to believe it.

“I just don’t like it,” Hyungseob mumbled through a pout. Somehow Jihoon’s expression hadn’t changed at all. Somehow he was inexplicably closer to Sunghyuk, the space between them measurable in atoms rather than any sensible scale. He was terrifying until the moment that a person even more obnoxiously yellow than the citric sound of their laugh approached.

“What’s this?” Dongmyeong asked as he skipped over and all-but tumbled into Sunghyuk’s lap. As surprised as Sunghyuk was, Jihoon’s only reaction was slight tension around his eyes as he withdrew his hand and curled it around Sunghyuk’s back. Haknyeon took the opportunity to stand and very casually walked over to Hyunmin.

“You’re interrupting an important conversation between friends,” Jihoon said. His voice didn’t sound any less friendly but Hyunmin found solace in the fact that Haknyeon too seemed to be cowering. Jihoon’s mouth stretched wider and he asked, “Why are you here?”

“Choi Seunghyuk told me that something terrible had happened to Sunghyuk so I had to come and see,” Dongmyeong replied cheerfully. He wasn’t a threatening person at all, at first glance, but Hyunmin supposed he could see why Sunghyuk had been afraid enough to ask for an escort on the way home just in case. Because he was so kind and considerate, Hyunmin put his arm around Haknyeon and pulled him against his side. He got a grateful smile for his efforts. It was good to be brave at times like this.

“You wanted to see something terrible happen to me?” Sunghyuk asked slowly.

“Of course,” Dongmyeong nodded earnestly. He received some particularly vicious looks from both Jihoon and Hyungseob. Doyeon managed to drag Yoojung over so they could be nosy more successfully.

“Why would you want that?” Sunghyuk asked weakly. Dongmyeong’s nose wrinkled with his smile as he prodded Sunghyuk’s cheek.

“You know why,” he sing-songed cryptically. Haknyeon shivered and huddled impossibly closer to Hyunmin. It warmed Hyunmin’s chest to know that when strange things were occurring around them, Haknyeon would choose Hyunmin. He smiled and barely bit back the urge to press a kiss to Haknyeon's cheek in front of all of these people. He was glad he didn't try to kiss Haknyeon. Any movement of that sort would likely have culminated in a headbutt from the shock of Jihoon’s next words.

“Yah, Son Dongmyeong! get your filthy hands away from my Sunghyukkie!”

“What?” Haknyeon gasped. He clamped his hands over his mouth immediately afterwards and Hyunmin bundled him into a tight hug. It was all Hyunmin could think to do to protect the cutest boy in the world. Hyunmin did feel a bit sorry for Sunghyuk, who was currently the opposite of protected. Jihoon was flapping an arm at Dongmyeong while roughly pulling Sunghyuk’s head into his lap. At this, Hyungseob finally snapped.

The sound that Hyungseob made was inhuman. Of course, Hyungseob often claimed that he wasn't something as dull and plain as a human, but the sound didn't fill Hyunmin’s mind with images of fairies either.

Hyungseob descended upon the kerfuffle, screeching at the top of his lungs about hating passive men even more than he hated people who tried to take his things. His input mostly seemed to be screaming and flailing his arms wildly while Jihoon had his legs wrapped around Sunghyuk’s torso and he rifled through his bag in search of a weapon. Dongmyeong was laughing brightly and pulling the hair of any person he could reach. It was a shame that Sunghyuk’s head was the perfect arm’s reach from him.

“What should we do?” Haknyeon asked as he clutched at Hyunmin. It was an interesting question and Hyunmin was hoping that the answer would be to get as far away from this mess as humanly possible. The next best answer came from between Haknyeon's perfectly shaped lips. “I don't want you to get involved. I don't want them to hurt you!”

That was that. No matter how much Hyunmin pitied his friends, Haknyeon had specifically told him to keep out of it. Hyunmin was nothing if not a man out to please God’s greatest gift Joo Haknyeon.

Kim Doyeon had other ideas about what people should do about the situation. As beautiful as she was, Hyunmin had suspected that she wasn't of this world. Like Hyungseob, the noises she was making summoned hellish despair to Hyunmin’s mind until he realised she had been calling out a name.

From nowhere, an existence springing from the will of Doyeon’s words, Kim Yehyun bolted into the combat area and struck all four offenders (well, three offenders and the hapless idiot they were brawling over) with one blow.

They all looked worse for wear as Yehyun looked down at them all disappointedly. Even Hyunmin felt ashamed and he had been very busy staying out of this while he did his best to protect Haknyeon with his best hug. The others must have been feeling much worse about themselves.

“What is the reason for so many students to be brawling in the streets when they should be preparing for their exams?”

Hyunmin wondered. Why was he watching all these ridiculous things when he should have been preparing for his exams? Or better yet, why wasn’t he somewhere, alone, with Haknyeon and being terribly romantic. He probably wasn’t going to do brilliantly at his exams anyway. The only mathematical equation he could think of was working out how many more times Haknyeon loved him compared to Hyungseob and their other friends (one hundred! What a perfect formula! One hundred times more!), and that was unlikely to be on any exam paper.

Yehyun sighed and shook his head. “Aren’t you misrepresenting yourselves too much? Do you have anything to say for yourselves?”

Jihoon, Dongmyeong, Hyungseob, and Sunghyuk didn’t seem to have anything to say. Hyunmin had something to say for himself but that was more of a secret. He leaned closer to Haknyeon’s ear and whispered, “I have something to say. I love Joo Haknyeon.”

Haknyeon was practically glowing with happiness. He whispered back, “I love Byun Hyunmin.”

It was all very cute and romantic until they noticed the look Yehyun was sending their way. Exasperation was in every line of his face as he said, “Do you think you are any better than the rest of them? Acting so lovey-dovey when you could be revising the things you learnt in school today?” He looked over at Doyeon and smiled piously. “Doyeon, thank you for calling me here to see the sorry state of the youth of today.”

Doyeon nodded very sombrely and didn’t seem able to part her tightly pressed lips.

Hyunmin didn’t like being scolded for no reason. He was trying to be comforting and supportive towards the love of his life. He totally wasn’t whining as he said, “I need to cheer up Haknyeon. A wild dog pooped on his shoe, you know.”

Dongmyeong groaned. “It was Haknyeon, not Sunghyuk. I can’t believe Seunghyuk lied to me.”

Yehyun turned a serious expression on Dongmyeong to shut him up before looking back at Hyunmin. “I was joking, you know. You two look very cute together. Shouldn’t you be off on a date instead of watching these kids fight?”

Hyunmin wholeheartedly agreed. This day could have been so much better if he and Haknyeon had gone on a date. Just the two of them. All alone. They still could have gone to eat pizza. Hyunmin could think of plenty of ways to romantically feed Haknyeon pizza. He could notice a smear of tomato on Haknyeon’s cheek and he would have no choice but to kiss it away. It would have been so much better than wondering how Seo Sunghyuk managed to attract so many people to his side.

“A date?” Haknyeon asked.

Yehyun’s forehead creased. “Yes? A date. Are you not going out with each other?”

Haknyeon was a very interesting shade of tomato. So refreshing and bright… and red. Hyunmin had no idea that somebody else could make Haknyeon turn this colour. He was impressed. Until he realised that he was the subject of Haknyeon’s dour expression.

“Hyunmin! We should be on a date!” He wailed. “Am I an idiot? We should be on a date! Why didn’t you tell me?”

Hyunmin hadn’t thought that he would need to tell Haknyeon something like that.

“I just thought that you didn’t want to go on a date with me.”

“I do! Of course I do,” Haknyeon pouted.

“Shall we go now?”

“But we can’t. My shoes…”

Haknyeon was the cutest, most adorable, most charming person that Hyunmin had ever met. He was beautiful even when he looked positively miserable. He looked so cute, but Hyunmin still wanted to see a good expression on Haknyeon’s face. That must have been why he said something a bit crazier than he was used to.

Hyunmin said, “I will buy you new shoes.”

“Ooh, how cool,” Doyeon commented in a low voice.

Hyunmin started to do some mental arithmetic but gave up quickly. He would apologise to his mum when he got home for spending so extravagantly.

“But that will be too much money,” Haknyeon protested.

“Buy me new shoes!” Hyungseob shouted before Jihoon slapped a hand over his mouth to prevent further outbursts.

“I will spend all the money in the world for you, Haknyeon,” Hyunmin declared. Besides, don’t I have nineteen years’ worth of birthday presents to buy you?”

“My birthday was months ago,” Haknyeon muttered. “Your birthday is coming up soon.”

Hyunmin nodded. “Call. You can buy me nineteen years’ worth of pizza on our date.”

Haknyeon looked happy enough with that. Hyunmin quietly supposed that they were both idiots if they were happy to follow that logic together. They said goodbye to everybody else as they started to leave. Even as Sunghyuk tried to ask if he was being left behind, they kept going and Hyunmin shouted goodbye louder.

And Hyunmin was happy that he finally got what he wanted. Though it was Haknyeon who cheekily kissed a smear of tomato from Hyunmin’s cheek.


End file.
